All that you can carry

My apartment building is being fumigated today.  Clearing out all of my cupboards last night, I had a temporary and unpleasant flashback to the fumigations of yesterday.  Luckily this fumigation is not in response to a specific problem of mine (e.g. roaches, bedbugs, mice).   In fact, I think it’s targeted against these innocuous ants that have quietly taken up residence throughout my apartment (including in my underwear drawer, mysteriously).

Because I don’t have house help or a family here, the maintenance person will be going through my apartment with the fumigator.  To prevent possible disappointment, I packed up my ‘valuables’ and brought them to work with me.  As I walked down the stairs with my work bag feeling only slightly heavier than usual, it occurred to me that with its contents, I could walk away from my apartment and never go back.  The bags of clothes and food that are now stacked on my furniture mean little to me.  When I leave, most of what I have will be passed on to colleagues and friends.

I’m still struggling with the significance of this (presuming there is some).  At home, I’d be hard pressed to walk out the door on any given day and think “I have all I could possibly need with me right now”.  But why is that? Sure, my things at home are (marginally) nicer.  After 8 months I also agree there is a chance that I’ve simply forgotten about the things that I was so attached to.  But I can’t help wonder, is this what it feels like to become a ‘rootless’ individual?  The sense that I could go just about anywhere with little notice, confident that I have or will find everything that I need?

And yet I am uncomfortable describing myself as rootless.  I think because it seems to imply something lonely and fragile.  But what I am describing is feeling as though I have everything I need.  Reading about this past week's events in Sudan I am yet again reminded of my good fortune- not only do I have things that I would voluntarily leave behind, I have the luxury of taking what is most important to me without compulsion.  Although I am no longer involved in the minutiae of the lives of the people I care most about, thanks to technology, I am rooted in the knowledge that we are still connected from across the world.  As I involve myself in the daily lives of my good friends here, I am nurturing a set of roots that will slowly span the globe.  One day I’m sure I’ll establish some physical roots.  In the meantime, rooted as I am and living on the top floor of my building, I'm relieved to be traveling light.

Ridin' Solo

For the better part of fifteen years, I have been committed to public transit.  I have walked and biked, taken subways, tuk tuks and bajajis and relied on the good graces of friends.  Not only has this allowed me to read more books and listen to more music, I’ve had the added bonus of considering myself to be doing ‘something good for the world’.  I never contemplated purchasing a car.

Until I moved to Dar es Salaam.

I remember the moment that the decision crystallized.  I had contacted my usual driver to pick me up half an hour in advance of a scheduled Skype conversation.  Twenty minutes later he was nowhere to be found.  After repeated calls, he showed up, but on our way to my house, he stopped to pick up another woman, who he said he had to drop off first! So we do the milk run and he gets me to my apartment approximately ten minutes late for my call…. A call which had to be conducted through Gmail because my computer was too old for the update Skype suggested I install.  (I had actively been trying to remedy this for the entire day, but the internet was so slow that I couldn’t download the old version to re-install it!) Needless to say, sitting at my kitchen table with my dress plastered to me, yelling into my computer, I decided there had to be a better way.

When you are a volunteer who has just finished blowing her savings on a trip to India, the options for what car you can buy are limited.  Discussing the matter with my father, he balked at the prices being sought for cars that are almost as old as the youngest of my brothers.  The statement ‘everything is expensive in Africa’ is not exactly consolation in the circumstances.  Lucky for me, a friend of a friend was selling their car and after he readily accepted my low-ball offer, I became the proud owner of a 1995 cerulean Rav 4. It’s as nice as you would expect, with functioning air conditioning, power locks and a tape deck.  I can tune in to about 4 radio stations, with a bit of advance fiddling with my antenna.  The highlight of its aesthetic is by far the wheel cover, which is a picture of a woman so faded by the sun she looks like a monkey.  I will attempt to link a picture through the title of this post. 

to making it count

Today I woke up in a mosquito filled banda on the Indian Ocean.  We got up, walked 100m in low tide and floated in the morning sunlight.  The rest of my day followed pace: drinking sweet masala chai at a teashop, listening to music while the rain beat against the windows, watching a movie, eating with my friends.  Only now towards the end of it, I am vaguely fretting over the things that I did not manage to do, namely chip away at a long list of errands I continually find myself putting off.

Those of you who know me know that I’ve been reading a lot of what I call the ‘hippie genre’ lately.  This evening I came across this passage (by Nadine Stair): “I’ve had my moments, and if I had to do over again, I’d have more of them.  In fact, I’d try to have nothing else.  Just moments, one after another, instead of living so many years ahead of each day.”

Yesterday, one of the dearest people in my life lost one of the dearest people in hers.  While there is nothing I can do that can alleviate that pain, I can honour his memory – by cutting the tether of my to-do list more often and filling the days that I have been given with moments.  

Gorillas in my midst

Owing to the extended Easter break here in Tanzania, I finally made it out of the country on an official holiday! Foolishly, I described the aim of my trip to track mountain gorillas in Uganda as “to discover the meaning of life”.  Perhaps owing to Ishmael, I had developed a colourful narrative whereby an hour with some not so distant primates would provide me with some deep insight into human existence.  Let me put your mind at ease early – this was not to be the case.

Our trip was five days, three of which were primarily driving.  Unexpectedly, this was one of the highlights of the trip.  The countryside of Uganda is spectacular.  The changing topography as we went to and through three national parks was the reward for our patience.  Savannah gave way to verdant valleys dotted with homes and garden terraces before revealing the deepest lake in Africa, Lake Bunyoni and finally, mountains loomed into view.  (Committed to the point and shoot, few of my pictures will have adequately captured this, but click on the title link to see). 

The first two nights we stayed in ------ for chimp trekking.  Our ‘budget’ accommodation turned out to be semi-permanent tent structures that were not only quite comfortable and bug free, but also home to a family of black and white colobus monkeys.  During one of our evening sundowners, a group of about twelve of them treated us to a show of jumping tree to tree, precariously perching on branches – and sometimes missing them altogether! 

Some might say that planning an animal-tracking excursion during the rainy season is not a very bright idea.  The morning of our chimp trek, rain was clearly in the forecast.  Thankfully, the forest canopy provides excellent shelter from the rain.  Also, the chimps were exceedingly cooperative, eating figs in a series of huge trees twenty-five minutes from where we started.  As we started to squint and strain to get good looks/pictures of the chimps, the rain abated.  For the full hour we had with them, all of us managed to stay dry and avoided being hit by the figs some of the young ones were throwing at us or the showers of urine that occasionally came down!